Cassian – POV
The image of Dravina’s face that night and again the following morning before I left replayed in my mind like a cursed refrain, relentless and unforgiving.
Her tear-stained cheeks, the terror etched into eyes that had once held nothing but warmth for me they haunted me. Burned into my memory. And as they resurfaced, unbidden, I couldn’t stop the tears that poured freely down my face.
I had hurt her. Unjustly. Brutally.
Unforgivably.
I was a monster.
Jealousy and fear had poisoned my thoughts, rotting them from within. I’d let my doubts fester until they twisted into something vile something that devoured logic, silenced reason. I hadn’t listened to her.
I hadn’t believed her.
Instead, I’d surrendered to my own darkness.
And in doing so, I shattered her.
I tore out o
